Issue No 198 2015

Figure 3: The effect of hybrid warfare on political will to respond
(as developed by the author)
In the event that political consensus is reached, the hybrid model is also designed to disrupt the military
response. However, hybrid warfare does not boast of its ability to destroy military units—an
acknowledged consequence of adopting irregular warfare is the degraded ability to mass combat power
against a regular counterpart. 26 Instead, hybrid warfare exploits the unresponsiveness of Western
military decision-making to non-traditional methods of war in two areas: identifying and understanding
the threat; and deciding and executing a plan. 27
As articulated by David Alberts and Richard Hayes, ‘understanding’ is the basis for sound decisionmaking,
as the situation informs the relevance, completeness, accuracy, timeliness and confidence of one’s
choice. 28 Hybrid threats are difficult to identify and understand. Hybrid threats do not declare war,
answer to a clear chain-of-command or wear identifying insignia. Despite recent Western military
experience in identifying threats in complex environments, a hybrid threat can have the unique advantage
of state-based capabilities to aid its concealment. Distinguishing a threat will be difficult for a soldier
confronted with the combined effect of numerous unconventional stakeholders, extensive misinformation
and state deniability.
Furthermore, if an element of hybrid warfare is identified, making sense of this entity or action in the
wider context is an even greater challenge. Russia’s decentralisation of effects was central to this
problem. As subsidiaries were empowered to perpetuate Putin’s intent, non-uniform threat
characteristics became evident across the battlespace. This heterogeneity made it difficult to recognise
whether the threat was part of a larger, coordinated plan or simply an anomaly.
Additionally, hybrid warfare employs decentralised activities to overwhelm Western military hierarchical
structures. Hierarchical military structures are designed to facilitate control and discipline of subordinate
units, and have not evolved significantly from the professionalisation of militaries in the 19 th century. A
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